FormKey vs Anima Synthesizer
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
FormKey
This app is an intuitive MIDI controller that helps musicians improve by using shapes for notes and colors for octaves. Its unique isomorphic keys aid in pattern recognition and chord discovery, making music creation more accessible.
- Shape-based note input
- Color-coded octaves
- Isomorphic key layout
- Pattern recognition aid
- Chord discovery assistance
- Future update commitment
Read full descriptionHide full description
Unlock your music potential. FormKey is the first music suite that helps you become the musician you've always imagined being, just by using it. INTRODUCING FORM Form is a new way to read and create music. Notes become shapes. Octaves become colors. Duration becomes a simple to read fraction. You can learn to read and play music in minutes. FormKey is the first release of the Form notation language, an open licensed music language designed to create instant music literacy. With the goal being to become a standard you'll see everywhere. THREE MODES: CREATE, LEARN, AND CONTROL • Create mode gives you a 16-track sequencer built on the classic drum machine workflow, modernized for today. Use your own AUv3 plugins or the three we built in to create full tracks from the ground up. • Learn lets you play and read your way through classical pieces while Form teaches you exactly what the music is doing, note by note. • Control turns FormKey into a MIDI controller for your external workflows, so it fits right into the setup you already have. THREE BRAND NEW AUv3 PLUGINS • Tone is a fully interactive subtractive synth that makes synthesis make sense. Every knob and connection is something you can hear and understand, so the architecture of a sound stops being a mystery. • Wave is a file-based sampler that lets you chop audio samples from your device, designed to make Slicing, and rearranging samples feel effortless instead of technical. • Patt3rn is a suite of modeled instruments curated to provide users with high quality options when looking for go to sounds every sequencer needs. • All 3 work in any host, so the instruments you learn in FormKey come with you wherever you go. SCALE MODE Reshape the keyboard to any of 26 scales, so every note you play stays in key. Choose from: • Major and minor: Major, Natural Minor, Melodic Minor, Harmonic Minor • Modes: Ionian, Dorian, Phrygian, Lydian, Mixolydian, Aeolian, Locrian • Pentatonic and blues: Major Pentatonic, Minor Pentatonic, Blues • Symmetric: Whole Tone, Whole-Half Diminished, Half-Whole Diminished, Augmented Hexatonic • World and exotic: Hungarian Minor, Neapolitan Minor, Byzantine, Enigmatic, Hirajoshi, In Sen, Kumoi, Iwato We've refined the interface across the app, making FormKey easier and more enjoyable to use. Every feature in FormKey is free to try. In celebration of our launch, $14.99 unlocks everything for the life of the app. We hope you love it as much as we do.
Anima Synthesizer
This app is a physical modeling instrument that simulates how sound is produced in the real world. It offers intuitive controls for shaping sound through energy, object resonance, and room acoustics. It supports MPE controllers and offers a unique microtonal playing experience.
- Physical modeling sound engine
- Intuitive ENERGY, OBJECT, ROOM controls
- Modal resonator for object shaping
- Morphable room acoustics simulation
- MPE support with zero setup
- Standalone and AUv3 instrument
- Ribbon and piano keyboard options
Read full descriptionHide full description
Anima is a physical modeling instrument. Sound happens the way it happens in the physical world: a breath excites an object, and the object rings out into a room. That is the whole interface, left to right: ENERGY, OBJECT, ROOM. The object is a modal resonator: twenty-four coupled resonances per voice whose frequencies, loudness, and decay follow physical laws you bend with the controls. Make it wood, glass, or metal. Stretch its partials from strings through piano wire into bells. Touch it at the edge, or hollow it out at the center. Blow at it, press it, strike it with a mallet that hits harder the higher you raise it. Push Inertia far enough and the note ignites and sings on its own breath. The controls are bold glyphs, shapes whose form is the value. No numbers at rest: the panel is a picture of the current sound, and it glides into a new shape when you load a preset. On an iPad the three sections share the screen; on an iPhone they sit side by side, a swipe apart, with the ribbon always under your fingers. Every control is easy to grasp and none of them stop at what the label says; finding what else a knob can do is part of the instrument. The ROOM is a morphable space: Size sets the echo's time, Regen goes all the way into self-oscillation, and Blur melts the repeats into a wash. Delay at one end, reverb at the other, one knob between them. Because every mode frequency is computed from the note, nothing ties Anima to the usual twelve pitches: it plays any tuning an MPE controller can send. Anima is the companion instrument to Hexatone; route Hexatone's MPE into it and per-note microtuning just works, with no configuration. - Standalone app and AUv3 instrument (AUM, Logic, GarageBand, Cubasis, Loopy Pro), on iPhone and iPad; your sound saves with the session - MPE with zero setup: per-note pressure is breath (press into a note and it can ignite), and the slide axis goes wherever you route it, any mix of the ENERGY and OBJECT controls, per note - Every control answers a fixed MIDI CC, so any hardware controller reaches the whole instrument with no mapping; pick a MIDI channel in the app, or play on all of them - Sustain pedal (CC64), MIDI Program Change, Glide, and 1 to 64 voices (at 1 it is a true mono synth) - A ribbon keyboard for true microtonal play (multitouch, per-finger glide, Hold to build chords, Snap or Loose), and a piano with properly wide black keys when you want the familiar - 55 factory presets in banks, including packs by Red Sky Lullaby and Hoavi; save your own, or copy any sound as text and send it to a friend - Undo and redo for every gesture, and the full manual lives inside the app - Collects no data; nothing leaves your device One purchase, iPhone and iPad. Headphones or a real speaker recommended: the low end of the breath is real.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is price: FormKey at Free against Anima Synthesizer's $7.99. Anima Synthesizer's advantage is rating (5.0 vs 4.5) and in-app purchases (none vs 1). On ratings volume, ads, monetization model and device support there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS
FormKey is free to download; Anima Synthesizer costs $7.99 up front. FormKey sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. Anima Synthesizer asks for nothing beyond the download.
Anima Synthesizer holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.5. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 8 and 3 respectively.
FormKey ships an update fortnightly, Anima Synthesizer every 6 days. The most recent releases landed on November 3, 2026 and November 10, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | FormKey | Anima Synthesizer |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free — better | $7.99 |
| Rating | 4.5 (8 ratings) | 5.0 (3 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 57.1% of reviews | — |
| Number of ratings | 8 — better | 3 |
| Update frequency | Fortnightly | Every 6 days — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | Yes | No — better |
| Monetization | Paid | Paid |
| Best chart rank | — | #180 — better |
| Devices | iPad | iPhone, iPad — better |
| Requires iOS | 18.6 | 17.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 88 MB | 4 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Polyhedra | Victorien Genna |
Customer experience
FormKey
Anima Synthesizer
In-app purchases
FormKey
- FormKey Full Unlock$14.99
Anima Synthesizer
No in-app purchases
Questions
Is FormKey free?
Is Anima Synthesizer free?
Which has better reviews, FormKey or Anima Synthesizer?
Do FormKey or Anima Synthesizer have ads?
Which is updated more often, FormKey or Anima Synthesizer?
Other comparisons















